“Hallelujah, forevermore”

Transfiguration of Our Lord
Mark 9:2-9

Have you ever noticed that God is a big fan of mountains? After the waters of the flood subsided, God landed the ark, which held Noah and his family, on Mt. Ararat. When it came to communicating with Moses, the mountain was the place…mostly Mount Sinai, the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments after hanging out with God for about 40 days. But God also communicated with the Israelites at Mt. Nebo during their wanderings in the desert. It was at Mt. Carmel that the showdown between Elijah and the prophets of Baal took place and God showed God’s self to be the only God. And it was at Mount Horeb, where Elijah encountered the still small voice of God, who encouraged Elijah in his work after he had fled from persecution by King Ahab and Jezebel.
So I suppose that it is no accident that Jesus was also a fan of mountains, in fact, they were his favorite place to retreat and pray. And if that’s the case, it’s no accident that on this day, the day of his transfiguration, Jesus went to the mountain once again. But this time, he wasn’t alone…he had brought his most trusted disciples along with him. We don’t know if Peter, James and John had any idea what they were in for that day…Mark tells us that they were frightened by what they saw up on the mountain. Suddenly, their leader was transformed…his face glowing and his clothes became a dazzling white…his holiness as the Son of God shining through. And if that’s not enough to startle you, Moses and Elijah then appeared and engaged Jesus in a Holy huddle. Then, to top it off, a cloud overshadowed them and they heard the voice of God declaring Jesus to be God’s son, the beloved, and they are ordered to listen to him.
I don’t know if I can say we can understand how frightened Peter was by this encounter that he wouldn’t know what to say so he just spouted off the first thing that popped into his brain. I don’t know if I can even say that it is something that can be imagined…a firsthand encounter with Moses and Elijah…hearing the voice of God…and seeing Jesus in the absolute fullness of his glory as the Son of God. Awe-struck is the first word that comes to mind…followed by a feeling of just how small a person is in relation to just how big God is. But then again, I’ve never been on a mountain with Jesus, Moses and Elijah…so I’m not about to say how I would feel about being a part of this specific, powerful encounter with the divine.
Perhaps, though, we can all speak to our experiences that have resulted from what happened after the encounter with Moses, Elijah and the voice of God. For after Jesus was transfigured, after he chewed the fat with Moses and Elijah and after the voice of God instructed the disciples as to who Jesus was and that they should listen, Jesus came down. Escorted by his most trusted cohorts, who were, no doubt, themselves changed by this experience, Jesus came down from the mountain and went back into the real world.
And the first thing that Mark tells us that Jesus did when he came down from the mountain was to enter into the darkness of a young boy plagued by demons and Jesus brought that boy healing, freeing him to live fully now that his darkness had been sent away.
In the transfiguration of Jesus, Peter, James, and John were blessed to receive a preview of the fullness of the glory of Jesus that would be shown to all the disciples and all others to whom Jesus appeared after his resurrection. And in truth, Peter was not inappropriate in his statement that it was good for them to be there and in his suggestion to build booths for Jesus, Moses and Elijah. Jesus could have very well stayed on that mountain…he could have remained in a place of glory…he deserved to stay up there in the fullness of his glory as the Son of God, flanked by Moses and Elijah…attended to by Peter, James and John. It would have been safer to live in the state of glory set apart only for the Son of God.
But Jesus knew that there was work to be done down in the valley that only he could do. Jesus had already seen the darkness that existed and still exists at the bottom of the mountain and knew that it was darkness that only he could dispel. Jesus knew that he was and is the one who could enter into that darkness with us who are slaves to sin and set us free to live in his light and receive his life.
So Jesus came down…he came down to enter into our darkness with us, to experience the darkest parts of our lives and then to set us free from that darkness having fully known what it is like to be human. Jesus came down to sit with us in our unbelief…to cry with us in our despair…to celebrate with us in our triumphs…to struggle with us in our afflictions. Jesus came down for the soldier tormented by battle scars…for the singer tortured by the demons of addiction…for the father so plagued with hate that it overcame the love for his children…for the mother lost in the grip of depression…for the high schooler so afflicted by the words of his tormenters that he starts to believe the awful things they say to him…for the young woman living in fear that she will be cast out from her family if she utters the words, “Mom, I’m Gay.” We all have dark places, places of struggle and doubt and fear that we would rather no one else knew about. But as much as we try to hide and mask these dark places in our lives, we cannot hide them from Jesus. Jesus knows our pains and he is there with us in those dark places to bring us life. We are never alone in the darkness…Jesus himself went to hell and back so that he could walk with us and so we would know light, life and peace.
Out of his love, God sent Jesus to come among us…and even after experiencing the fullness of his glory, in seeing the depth of the darkness in our world, Jesus came down from the mountain. There was work to do…there were people to heal…there was light to spread…and in the end, there was a cross waiting for him…a cross that would set us free from the grasp of death and bring us in to the fullness of the new life that is in store for us.
This is what the transfiguration is about…that Jesus, knowing the absolute fullness of his glory, loved us so much that he came down from the mountain, entered into our darkness, and went to the cross so that in giving his life, we could have life, love, peace, and joy. Hallelujah forevermore.